Warlock Apprentice

Angor watched as a group of cultists rampaged in the shop. Also, he recognized someone in their rank.

Saladin.

Their violent display easily silenced every customer. Someone was already trying to sneak away. Even powerful wizards would not want to provoke these vengeful and cold-blooded thugs and earn their endless grudge.

An apprentice with a swollen body carefully moved to the back door to escape. But as soon as he put his hand on the doorknob, a knight sword came his way and slashed his pouch apart, causing several items to drop on the floor.

The fat man jumped and trembled as he watched one of the robed men, who just threw his sword, approached him.

“What-what do you want?? I-my teacher is-” the fat apprentice stuttered with running nose and tears.

The cultist showed a disgusted look. “By the world’s consciousness… How did a junk like you become an apprentice?”

Despite his hostile attitude, the cultist in black did not harm his target. Instead, he searched among the dropped contents and picked up a white seedling with silk-like strings growing on it, which looked like a cobweb.

“Arachnid’s Kiss, native to Abyss Plane, chances of developing intelligence and turning into man-hunting magic plant…” Another cultist approached them and released a small ember from his hand, which burned the low-level magic plant to ash while the fat apprentice stood still and watched without saying anything.

“Get out of my sight,” the first cultist ordered and knocked the fat man away by kicking his backside.

Instead of feeling humiliated, the apprentice looked pretty happy that he finally got to escape. While running, he knocked over an iron cage that contained a young lady with gray hair inside.

The cage fell right in front of the first cultist and blocked his way. It seemed the mortal girl was already terrified when the cultists spread their murderous intent all over the place. Her face wasn’t looking so well when she saw the man in front of her giving her a cold look.

As the cruel-looking cultist crouched down to check her, the other onlookers all expected bloodshed since it was so common for apprentices to use tyranny against mortals, especially when a member of the infamous Supreme Cult was involved.

However, what they imagined did not happen. The cultist lifted the cage to its right position and spoke to the girl, in an obviously gentler voice, “Are you hurt?”

The addressed girl only shook her head as she couldn’t talk well in her mental condition.

“Good.”

The cultist used a simple cantrip to smoothen the girl’s messed up hair before leaving to check the other cages.

Angor was pretty surprised to see a Supreme Cult member acting so “friendly”. When he wondered what these people were up to, the same cultist turned to look at everyone else.

“This is a routine inspection for finding hidden intruders from foreign planes. Please feel free to go on with your own affairs.”

Following his words, the other cultists spread to further check the rest of the store.

“Do they do this often?” Angor whispered to the cat-eared saleswoman, who was having trouble recovering from her fear.

“You-are you talking to me?”

Angor nodded.

The woman glanced at the men in black robes and showed an inconspicuous angry look. “Yeah… every now and then. What a bunch of nuisance…”

“But who allowed them to?” Angor frowned. Cork Street was still under the administration of Floating Mech City. Judging from all the patrolling Rune Monitors and strict city rules, Angor believed that Lawson was quite the “routineer”. Would someone like him sit by and watch the Supreme Cult as they forced their own laws upon the citizens?

The saleswoman was a little surprised by Angor’s question, but before she could answer, the cultist who just retrieved his sword moved to them.

“I can give you the answer to that,” the man said as he gazed at Angor with a scorning look. “We don’t listen to anyone’s rule. THAT, is what we obey.”

The man pointed at the sky.

Angor narrowed his eyes and smiled. “I see. I understand why Mister Lawson… chose to overlook such actions.”

The cultist checked again and was a bit alarmed when he noticed that this hooded figure in front of him was the only customer in the shop who wasn’t afraid of them. He already ascertained this figure’s strength—a level-3 apprentice, just like him.

“You—”

Before the cultist could continue, Saladin’s ears twitched as he looked away from the slave he was examining. “YOU! You broke your limit and gained another level?”

“Oh, Saladin,” Angor replied, “what a coincidence.”

Saladin didn’t say anything further but his fearful expression gave him out.

Both Angor and the cultist he was talking to wondered what scared Saladin so much.

“Saladin, you-who is he?” the cultist asked while pointing a finger at Angor.

His action successfully put Angor under the spotlight. Everyone on the scene, including the cat-ear saleswoman, wondered who this hooded young man was.

Saladin remained silent for a while and used voice transmission to answer in private.

The robed cultist considered something and walked away, which yet again astonished the other customers.

Did that bastard just back down from someone? But how?!

Angor assumed that the cultist acted like this because Saladin mentioned Sunders’ name. Everyone knew that the terrifying gentleman, who assaulted Bogula out in the open just to retrieve his student, was still in the city. Of course, no one would want to get him angry without a reason.

Soon, the cultists finished their “inspection”, which did not yield any result, and left the shop as quickly as they came.

Angor kept his attention on Saladin and noticed that this particular cult member never lifted that terrified look. In fact, Saladin’s expression looked exactly the same as what he showed during the garden challenge, when Angor trapped him in an illusion created by Nightmare Fear cantrip.

He considered and decided to do a small test by sending a voice transmission to Saladin:

“It is the world’s consciousness? Or the devil?”

This was what he heard from Saladin before the man used a teleportation scroll to escape.

Saladin’s irises shrank suddenly upon hearing Angor’s words, and he quickly disappeared with his team.

…

The entire Rosy Boutique remained quiet for a while even after the cultists had left. As people moved on the look at their desired slaves, some of them began casting curious glances at Angor.

The escaped fat apprentice had returned as well, but this man did not follow the rules and was cursing loudly.

“Hey, you there! Bring me that fox-girl from earlier. I’ll buy her. And where did my stuff go? Don’t f*cking tell me someone took them!”

In fact, no one was interested in his dropped items as nothing in there looked very valuable.

This fat man was a very typical apprentice who would act snobbish when dealing with different people. Just like the cultist who checked him said earlier, someone with such a crude nature was not fit to become a supernatural. It was a waste of talent.

“Those losers only know how to pick on these small shops!” He continued to bad-mouth the cultists since they were no longer here. “Why not go and ‘inspect’ Sky Auction? I dare them! I mean, the auction has been selling otherworldly slaves, and yet, the cowards have never made a sound! Obeying the world’s consciousness? My a*s! They’re a bunch of dogs who will get their a*ses kick when true wizards are around!”

Many of the customers nodded to agree. Even the Black Bishop from the Supreme Cult could not openly disrupt the biggest auction held by Floating Mech City.

“You know what? The cowards can’t even do anything to Pierre’s little shop!” another guest added.

Nobody continued on this matter, although Angor was very interested in what he just heard.

“What’s wrong with Pierre? Does he have wizards as guards?” he asked the saleswoman again.

Probably because she sensed that the boy was not an ordinary person, the woman replied in a clearly more polite manner this time, “That’s not it, sir. Pierre doesn’t hire guards, and he himself is not very strong. It is… his ‘goods’ that are not to be underestimated. If all the slaves work together, even the cultists won’t dare to fight them.”

Angor was still confused about this “Pierre” man. He decided to check that place out later since “powerful slaves” sounded like someone related to foreign planes.